First published in 1998, this valuable reference work offers concise, expert answers to questions on all aspects of life and culture in Medieval England, including art, architecture, law, literature, kings, women, music, commerce, technology, warfare and religion. This wide-ranging text encompasses English social, cultural, and political life from the Anglo-Saxon invasions in the fifth century to the turn of the sixteenth century, as well as its ties to the Celtic world of Wales, Scotland and Ireland, the French and Anglo-Norman world of the Continent and the Viking and Scandinavian world of the North Sea. A range of topics are discussed from Sedulius to Skelton, from Wulfstan of York to Reginald Pecock, from Pictish art to Gothic sculpture and from the Vikings to the Black Death. A subject and name index makes it easy to locate information and bibliographies direct users to essential primary and secondary sources as well as key scholarship. With more than 700 entries by over 300 international scholars, this work provides a detailed portrait of the English Middle Ages and will be of great value to students and scholars studying Medieval history in England and Europe, as well as non-specialist readers.

First published in 1998, this valuable reference work offers concise, expert answers to questions on all aspects of life and culture in Medieval England, including art, architecture, law, literature, kings, women, music, commerce, technology, warfare and religion. This wide-ranging text encompasses English social, cultural, and political life from the Anglo-Saxon invasions in the fifth century to the turn of the sixteenth century, as well as its ties to the Celtic world of Wales, Scotland and Ireland, the French and Anglo-Norman world of the Continent and the Viking and Scandinavian world of the North Sea. A range of topics are discussed from Sedulius to Skelton, from Wulfstan of York to Reginald Pecock, from Pictish art to Gothic sculpture and from the Vikings to the Black Death. A subject and name index makes it easy to locate information and bibliographies direct users to essential primary and secondary sources as well as key scholarship. With more than 700 entries by over 300 international scholars, this work provides a detailed portrait of the English Middle Ages and will be of great value to students and scholars studying Medieval history in England and Europe, as well as non-specialist readers.

Henry Daniel’s Liber Uricrisiarum is the earliest known work of academic medicine written in Middle English, presented here for the first time in a complete edition. Working in the late 1370s, Daniel combined authoritative medicine from written sources with his own personal experience, creating a text that stands out for its linguistic originality, intellectual scope, and wide circulation. Extant in over three dozen manuscript witnesses and two early modern print copies, Liber Uricrisiarum describes medieval humoral theory, anatomy, physiology, disease, medical astronomy, reproductive processes, and more, all within the broader context of uroscopic diagnosis. The introduction situates the text and its author in their medical, intellectual, linguistic, and bibliographic contexts, outlining the uroscopic tradition to which Daniel contributes, and describing the relationships among the many manuscripts containing the Liber Uricrisiarum. This edition presents the Middle English text, with a general glossary, glossary of proper names, and explanatory notes that explain obscure words and phrases and identify Daniel’s sources. It also includes the complete set of diagrams contained in the Royal manuscript; appendices providing the Latin and English versions of the prologue and epilogue; an extensive translation from one of Daniel’s important sources, Isaac Israeli’s De urinis; tables relevant to Daniel’s astronomical measurements; and an analysis of the Royal manuscript’s dialect. Cumulatively, the edition and apparatus introduce readers to an important yet understudied text, the details of which will have significant impact on studies of medieval medicine and science, intellectual history, and Middle English language and literature.

The imagery of marriage and the family in Piers Plowmanrelated to contemporary social history. Kindly Similitude is the first study to offer a detailed reading of the many passages in Piers Plowman A, B, and C concerned with marriage and family, and to place them within the frameworks of contemporary social history, law, theology, exegesis, and literature. The author shows how Langland draws on the experiences of familial life both literally and metaphorically to further his expositions of law and love, nature and grace, the image of God in individuals and society, the use of time and material goods, the perversion of right relationships through covetise, and doing well in the active life. For Langland, an unmistakably public poet, the marital householdis inextricably linked to religious, economic, and political institutions. It reflects and transmits a divine exemplar of community, and plays a fundamental role in creating the society in which he and his audience must live. Thisimportant new critical approach complements the strong current attention to the poem's intellectual and ecclesiological contexts. Professor M. TERESA TAVORMINA is at the Department of English, Michigan State University.